I went to Cape Girardeau MO about 2 hour drive south of St. Louis. We were going to head to Corpus, but weather looked like crap. So I decided to go to my dad's. The IP that I asked to go was a fellow Coastie and C-130 driver.. had never been to the mid-west.
First leg we went up to about 12K.. after first stop, we had enough of that. Drooling in the O2 max is not my idea of fun.. that, and noone can understand you.
Each of our legs was about an hour or so.. followed by the an average of 3 approaches before landing, refueling and moving on.
3x's a day is max. I did 3 RI's on the way up.. Whiting to Birmingham.. Birgmingham to Greenville MS (not much there, but had several nice approaches).. then landed in Cape Girardeau at the completion of day 1 of their local Air Show.
2nd day was the 2 Day VNavs (1500' up the Mississippi, cruised around St. Louis at 1500 ft, landed at Downtown Airport, up again, flyby of the Arch, back to Cape).
Then Sunday, 1 RI on the way back, the I4390 and then a night VNav to home field followed by a few PARs.
It was nice having short legs.. I mean, you can only learn so much navigating air ways and then you're just wasting time IMHO... not to mention, killing your ass bone. Most of our routes were 8000 or 9000 ft to keep cool, but also to stay off the O2 mask.. bleck.
And yeah, 1015 on the power setting ~ 190 KIAS the whole way.